Southern Whites: Your Moment of Truth

Hey,

Author Lewis Norden is participating in a Wake County Reads event this week, and was interviewed today on WUNC (Chapel Hill.) I was blown away by his recollection of being a Mississippi 15-year-old in 1955 hearing his friends joke about the murder of Emmett Till-- and hearing one boy say "I'm with the black child." (His novel Wolf Whistle depicts the Till lynching.) At that moment Norden saw the corruption of the system in which he was living. Which made me recall one day in 1965 in my 5th grade class in Virginia, when my teacher Ann Johnson replied to some racist bullshit I spouted: "How would you feel if you were black?" THE ABYSS OPENED. God bless you, Mrs. Johnson, I will never forget that moment. It changed my life. Southern white DUers-- can you remember a single moment where your loyalty shifted, permanently?

CYD

What sort of "truth" are you looking for?

He/she's interested in when people came out of the subtle racism closet.

Not to mention the other races of mankind. Or the only racists we know of, the "White Southerner".

How else do you keep electing Trent Lott?

"There's lots and lots of racist Southerners" because we are the only ones who have the guts to admit it. ;-)

It's just that the South is more known for it. I hear a lot of slurs towards African Americans and gays in NY. Also, the Great Plains has it's fair share of Aryan Nation nuts (ie. Idaho).

I'll happily confess there are lots of racists in the north. But there's plenty more in the South. And every time that's brought up people with a little to much pride in the South whine about South bashing instead of admitting it. Oh! You have racism in the north too! So stop saying that!

The first step is admitting that you have a problem.

to the extent that I'm not aware of it. Just because being black is not my personal experience. But it's a mistake for you to presume I don't see a lot, because I do.

I I reiterate, white racists in the south are more likely to admit acutally being racist that somebody from the north.

edit: What I really hope is that when I don't know what it's like, which is often, I hope someone feels comfortable enough with me to tell me, to educate me, to share their experiences.. Because, how do I know, if I don't ask? Or you're too afraid to tell me?

That "you" was southerners in general, I didn't specify.

"white racists in the south are more likely to admit acutally being racist that somebody from the north."

I agree. Perhaps because racism is more socially acceptable in the South?

While I thank you for the exception, I deserve no special dispensation. I come from the same stock as the racist crowd. I refused to disown them just because you dont' like them.

Perhaps because racism is more socially acceptable in the South?

You might find this perverse, but I rather prefer someone to tell me they are racist rather than my guessing about it. "The Devil YOu know..." and all that.

I much prefer someone to be upfront about their motives and what they're about. I really hate someone telling me how "liberal" they are, how accepting they are.. all the while:

- trying to sell me on school vouchers,
- why "white flight" is a good thing
- why they support the death penalty

I prefer honesty above all, even if it is a vicious kind of honesty. At least we are not deludng ourselves.

...to one of those lying ones? I agree.

Sad but true.

The Conservatives are still the opposition, but they are honest about it. neo-Cons are rising to the level of being an actual enemy, even for the Conservatives. It's easy to respect my oppositon. My enemy I just want to shoot.

I just wistfully sigh about what the GOP could have become if they had not listened to the neo-cons during the Regan years. :eyes:

edit: All this divisive shit started with Jesse Helms' notorious Congressional Club with Richard Vigurie and his partner doing the fundraising. That was the test case for the GOP to try out all these wedge racial issues.

I feel much sorrow and regret about not being able to do anything about them in the 70s and early 80s.

There are not more in the South. All my experience, including my half-black half-sisters who said the only time they got called "nigger" was in Massachusetts, suggests the opposite. The problem is national. Southerners are more inclined to acknowledge it than Northerners, who pretend that they are pure and innocent.

Here's just one example I have on hand:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=113x8080

There are plenty more. But this is a bit of an intellectual pissing contest. There is racism in the north, any racism anywhere is too much. But we aren't going to solve any problems by ignoring the truth and saying, "oh yeah, you do it too!"

...which dosen't fit our nice comfortable view of reality. I was born Southern, raised inthe North, and I am back in the South again. I will tell you this much. Racism and bigorty of all kinds exists in even parts all over the US and among all people. It isn't nice. It isn't comfortable. It definately dosen't fit with most peoples perceptions of reality. But reality and perception of reality are often horribly far apart.

We don't feel the screaming need to wallow in it every time it gets brought up though. Nor are we going to assume that every person, or as some woud have you believe every white person, in the south is racist either.

Oh! You have racism in the north too! So stop saying that!

YUP!!!

Happens every fucking time.

Just gotta look harder.

You're hopscotching all over this thread harping on my replies to other DUers.

However, my mommy says I have to come inside now. Maybe we can play some more tomorrow.

Let me know when. I'll bring the popcorn.

We had a KKK clan cell in the county I spent most of my life in. I grew up in NW Ohio, just south of the Michigan border.

It is true waht you say though. There are a lot of racists in the South. White ones, black ones...Hispanic ones...Asian ones...

Funny thing about that. Racism, bigotry, and intolerance know no race. It ahs no borders and no limits.

For God's sake don't spread the blame

I am a southern white boy who confronted the immensity of his racist heritage at age 11 when a fifth grade teacher asked a simple question that stopped me in my tracks. Lewis Norden's moment of truth was at age 15 in a locker room.

Forget the FACT that racism is just as much a problem outside the South as within it; that's not my point. My point is that for liberal white Southerners there was a MOMENT OF TRUTH when we realized whose side we were really on.

I'm jsut trying to figure out where you were headed. Prehaps find out what hypocrasy might be invovled, adn what it's limits might be as well. You asked a very pointed question. Did you honestly expect not to get pointed questions and responses in return?

Hey, I've lived in your area, graduated from high school just north of the OH/MI line and believe that racism is far more overt and extreme up there than it is down here. Heard the N word far more often up there than down here and hate the DU threads that scapegoat the South as if all racism was in this region. In VA and NC even in the worst cases it's love/hate; in OH and MI I got the impression that many whites felt pure unadulterated hate for blacks. We can't pretend they're "outsiders" down here after exploiting their labor for centuries!

Nonetheless, Norden blew me away with his moment of truth, reminded me of my own in 5th grade, and inspired me to ask what other comparable moments of truth Southern DUers had experienced.

Peace,

CYD

I watched in horror as this thread veered senselessly and cluelessly off course.

I'm interested in hearing answers to YOUR question -- not to a geography lesson of who has the most/best/worst racists.

...to discuss racism in all it's permutations? Interesting.

don't put words in my mouth.

why put all facets of racism in one thread?

surely these issues can be broken up for discussion in other posts.

why not stick to the subject at hand?

Breaking the subject up makes the otehr fragments different, prehaps less imporatnat. Maybe even unworthy of the term? Hey, maybe only white people in the south are racist. Damn. We've just solved the racism problem in America. Shoot all the white southerners.

you're going to have to find someone else to argue with.

hey, I'm just trying to hang out.

paste your bullseye on someone else's forehead -- i refuse to play.

not tonight anyway.

you're not destroying MY buzz.

I was lucky enough to have been raised by a black woman who mom hired to take care of me. She already had 5 kids of her own, but they needed the money. Mom split her lab tech's salary with her 50/50.

Mildred always referred to me as her white baby and she is my second mom. LOL! I love that family has much as the ones I'm really related to.

edit: I'll add two more, both involving my mother:

1) In I'd say 1970 or so (not positive on the year), Momma took me to an NCAE (NC Assoc of Educators) statewide convention. They were ANGRY and thinking about organizing, real union-style stuff. There was talk of a possible teachers' strike, which is why momma and I went. It was a genuine political convention, complete with speeches at the podium and delegates sitting together by congressional district. I was enthralled.

"Momma, which district are we in?"

"We're in the 9th district. See the banner down there on the floor? That's our delegation."

This was seminal conversation about representational politics and getting your voice heard.

2) Fast forward to summer 1973. We are spending the summer sewing new clothes.... and watching the Watergate hearings. Again I was enthralled. So was Mom. It was the best soap opera. ever.

When I was 11 or 12, I loved to listen to Rush because my parents hated him so much. He was racy, arrogant, un-PC, and absolutely sure of himself. Even though I didn't really have much in the way of political beliefs at the time, Rush and I were at the same the same maturity level so I kind of connected to him. Then one day, Rush announces in one of his trademark rants something like "The only thing a tree is good for is making toilet paper". I don't know why it affected me so much, as it probably wasn't the most ignorant thing I've heard him say, but it was such an obvious lie and it made me wonder just what kind of world he and his followers wanted to live in. Ever since then, I knew the right had nothing to offer worth taking.

I also liked listening to Rush when I was about 12. You're right; his humor is on the same level as the average pre-teen, or Beavis & Butt-head. Huh, huh, he said "feminazi."

It's funny how lots of people never grow out of that.

read and that really showed me something was wrong.

My family wasn't racist but I certainly grew up in a totally segregated town.

Another eye-opener was hearing an aquaintance in high school being furious that the black alterations lady (probably 40+) at the store where she worked part-time didn't call her 'Miss Jane.'

And one of the major experiences in realizing I really didn't live in the same world the other kids did....

...a year before the 1954 school segregation case my 8th grade social studies class was talking about the Nazi treatment of the Jews in WWII and how awful it was...

...and the teacher (maybe a student) asked 'and what about how Negroes are treated here?'

...and the same students outraged at the Nazi treatment of the Jews saw not the slightest similarity; the treatment of Negroes was perfectly OK.

I was raised in a racially diverse neighborhood and went to a well integrated school. Half the kids I played with growing up were black. It didn't seem like a big deal because none of our parents made it a big deal. I never concieved of a world that was any different from the one I lived in when I was little. I wish everyone could grow up that way because I know it had a profound effect on the way I relate to people and on my perception of the world.

When I was around 17....I realized that none of the people I admired from American culture or history were or right wingers or Jerry Fawell types...

I think when I realized there was racism and did not want to be on the "bad" side was when I sat next to a black migrant worker's child Darlene, my name is Marlene and the teacher constantly confused us, so we became friends. Out on the playground my cousins were yelling at us, "wanna play cowboys and niggers?" - and I was so offended and disgusted, that I played with the migrant kids even more. It got real lonely for me when they moved on, and I was left alone at recess. Life sucks sometimes, but I often wonder where Darlene and my recess buddies are, and hope they made it okay.

PS I was 7 or 8 years old when the C& N crap happened.

PPS I was raised in upstate NY and our little town had ONE malotto family. This incident happened when we moved into the Central NY/ Mohawk valley part of NY, for one year.

My great-great Grandfather owned a large plantation, fought in the "War Of Northern Aggression", etc.

So, as an ignorant child and teenager, I believed that it was my family duty to have Confederate sympathies. Although, I will say, that my parents NEVER fed me any kind of racial or ethnic bigotry.

I grew up fast, though, when I watched the movie "The Long Walk Home" as a young adult. I have NEVER had any sympathy for "The South" or any kind of ethnic hatred since watching that movie.

thing in the South. I want to stress whatever I've said here applies equally to our new latino neighbors, our asian friends, etc.

They seem to get lost in these discussions about "how well do you really handle diversity?"

and I would be very interested to learn how our new residents feel about their reception in NC. Asian immigration seems more limited to areas with universities, but is a factor in the Triangle and Triad.

And I'm finding it hard to find places to hear what they have to say. I wish I knew spanish.... all I hear is how easy it is to learn.

I was in a crew with 4 White thugs, 4 decent Black guys, and a Choctaw Indian. I had never been around Blacks or Indians before, and I gravitated towards eating lunch with them, and sharing breaks. Later, while cleaning the City School Bus yard, one of the Black guys I liked, ( LARGE athlete named James) found a "George Wallace for President" car tag. He looked at it carefully, spat on it, and tossed it into the garbage.

I felt like a veil had been lifted from my eyes. The following month, school started. That was the year our local White high school merged with our local Black high school, so we all wound up in class together.

Several year later, while we were working at a poultry plant, James came to my rescue when some other Black guy wanted to give me a hard time. He told him to leave me the fuck alone and the guy backed off immediately.

Thats my story. I'll never forget him spitting on that tag.